Wild Thing
by Mr. Muse
Summary: Reports indicate Red Court activity in Panama, a country held and made safe by the Fellowship of Saint Giles. Nathan Sharpe, a newly trained agent for the Fellowship is sent to investigate. Will he survive when the world, his partner and his own unnatural desires turn against him?
1. Chapter 1

"The Dresden Files" is the Property of Jim Butcher. This story is based in the universe of "The Dresden Files". This work is just for fun and still being edited. Please write a review or just make a comment if you have any thoughts!

Thanks,

Mr. Muse

Chapter: 1

I smelled blood, human blood and for a moment it stole my mind from me. Its sudden intensity was intoxicating, and I was not prepared. I lost my focus for several heart beats, forgetting time, place and company alike. I caught myself though and desperately I fought to regain my grip on reality. When I came back to myself I realized I had paused for seconds in telling a story. The Summers family sat around me all of them blonde and blue eyed they stared at me in anticipation. I struggled mentally once more to remember where I was in the telling.

Playing off my momentary distraction as dramatic pause I continued, " an aAAANNND THEN! … the coyote spirits came rushing into the camp eyes burning red, teeth bared. They devoured the remaining members of the camp in the dust-storm they brought behind them! Their screams could be heard even fro where I stood above them, at the canyon's edge." I paused again for dramatic effect and then drew out the last words with ominous tone, "The treasure hunters…. we never found a trace of them." The Summers family all gasped in shock when I ended the story. Their faces lit by the dying embers of the camp fire we sat around were cast in sharp shadowed relief.

"Oh that was sooo good," said Mrs. Summers. "I haven't heard a ghost story that good since I was in the girl scouts." Mr. Summers nodded. His wife had been leaning into him like a cheerleader who had gone to see a horror film with her captain of the football team boyfriend. It was a wonder she managed it; what with both her and her husband sitting in those deep canvas collapsible camping chairs. Mr. Summers had his arm around her, holding her close, completing the tableau. He had a smile on his face, perhaps he was the nostalgic type.

"Thank you," I said, "I'm glad you liked it." I made sure to separate my panic from my expression and fixed a genial smile on my face. Sensory information flooded into me in direct proportion to the adrenaline being dumped into my bloodstream and I welcomed it. As is the way of half-turned vampires in the presence of blood, I became hyper-aware of my environment. Bobby, their son was sunk down into his camp chair clutching his fire poking stick as if it were the only thing in the world that could defend him against the unknown evils of the surrounding darkness. Little Sandy, his younger sister by about three years, was on the edge of her seat. I had enraptured her with my tale, her reaction had been much the same as her mother's. Hector, their old Labrador shifted nervously in my lap as if he sensed something too. Then obviously unconcerned, the big guy licked me on the side of the face, wagged his tail and then snuggled back down in my lap again. My eyes scanned the trees around me and I silently berated myself for becoming night blind in front of the fire.

"Tell another one!" said Sandy pleadingly. I wanted to get away. Not for my sake but for theirs. Why all of a sudden did I smell blood? Where was it coming from? Is someone dead? I had to find the source of the smell or I wouldn't be able to sleep.

"It's gotten pretty late," I said, making a show of looking at Mr. and Mrs. Summers as though I was concerned about bed time. The pair of them gave me appreciative looks. "I think it might be bed time for somebody I know."

"Not mee!" she said, "I'm not tired at all." Little Sandy had put on a brave face but I could tell she was fighting hard to stay awake in her bundle of blankets. Though I had now an urgent reason to get away, now would have probably been the best time to leave even had I not felt the call of my demon.

"We need to let Mr. Sharpe go to bed Sandy," said Mrs. Summers.

Mr. Summers added, "I'll bet he's been up past his bed time just like you have missy."

Sandy let out a moan of disappointment, "Awwww. I don't wanna go to bed!" She looked at me with big, blue, sleepy, pleading eyes. I smiled back at her. I had to. She was just so damn cute. "Can't you stay?"

"No, I best get going." I chivied a drowsy Hector out of my lap, stood up and folded up my camp chair. Hector leaned against me and wagged his tail.

"I'm glad we met you Sharpe. You certainly tell a good story." He said it like I was actually good at spinning tall tales. He had no idea that it was a real accounting of my last trip to the Grand Canyon three years ago. I turned around to face him. He was holding out his hand for me to shake it and I did.

"Yeah, this was fun," I said.

"Are you going to be here tomorrow, Mr. Sharpe?" asked Sandy looking up at me hopefully.

"I'm going for a hike tomorrow. I don't think I'll be back till late," I replied. What I said was true, but depending on what was out there in the forest I might not be back at all.

"Oh, yeah? Where you headed?" asked Mr. Summers.

"I haven't decided yet. I'll probably wander around a while and see where the wind takes me." Well the scent trail, where it will take me is where I'll go.

Mrs. Summers spoke up then, "Well we hope you have a good time."

"I'm pretty sure I will," I said, "I love the outdoors."

Sandy stood up abruptly, something of fear and panic in her eyes as she looked in my direction. I wheeled around looking for the source of danger. But there was nothing, just the dirt road of the campgrounds and other dimly lit campsites. Then without warning something soft and child-sized hit me from behind and wrapped itself around my knees holding me in place. I looked down to see Sandy staring up at me with genuine fear and concern. I was immediately uncomfortable. Sandy was not my little girl. We had only known one another four days and now she was clinging to me. Broad shouldered, narrow hipped and built like a centurion, I towered over the diminutive girl and could only stare back uncertainly.

"You can't go! What if the V'mpires come?" she said stumbling over the word 'vampires' as she struggled to get all the words out as fast as she could. What was with the change of heart? I had thought she enjoyed my stories.

"Sandra!" admonished her mother. She came out of her seat and finished, "Let him go. We've talked about this. You can't just grab people."

"But Mr. Sharpe, you're the only one who knows all about the monsters!"

I was suddenly even more uncomfortable. I had certainly made an impression on this little girl. I tell these stories whenever I can so as to disseminate facts; facts about the supernatural world. I try as hard as I can to inform people without scaring them. I considered Sandy for a minute. Glancing at her parents I knelt down to speak to Sandra on her level. "I tell ya' what Sandy. You need to think about this for a bit. She stood back and I took her little hands in mine and said "Why would a hungry Vampire want to come eat you? You're wee bitty little thing. You wouldn't be much to eat, would you?" Ironically, I did know of a few children who had been bitten; most of them turned.

Without missing a beat she said, "But what about Mom and Dad. Bobby's bigger than me too. What about him?"

"Remember what I said about your house? If you stay inside your home, the Vampires can't get you."

"Unless you invite them in!" she finished nodding.

"That's right. Besides, you've got Mommy and Daddy to protect you and I bet Bobby would beat'm all up for you. It's what big brothers do." I saw Bobby sit up a little straighter and mustering himself he wrenched down on his fire stick and gave me a determined look. I didn't know where Bobby stood on my story, but I liked the look he gave me.

"I think you're pretty smart, kiddo. They won't be able to 'get' you."

"I'm still scared," she said.

Sighing I said, "Knowing beats fear Sandy. If you want to stop being afraid of something. You need to learn about it." She nodded.

I looked up at her parents now and I could see the concern on both their faces. If they didn't like what I was saying I'd had no doubt that either of them would have put a stop to the conversation immediately. Mrs. Summers came over and picked Sandy up and put her on her hip. "Everything is going to be alright hon'. There are no such things as vampires or monsters." What would she say if she knew she was speaking those words in front of something close to both those things?

I just smiled at the pair of them, standing back up. To deny that would be an outright lie on my part. I don't lie if I can help it. Sandra was still looking worried and I wondering if I could do anything further, acted automatically. I reached into my back pocket took out my wallet and handed little Sandy Summers my card. It's something I do when I find someone worth protecting. I give them a way to get in contact with me. She took it uncertainly and tried her best to read it.

"Nathan Sharp-y. F. O. S. G." she read aloud and then the phone number that came after it. Mrs. Summers took hold of the card and read it to herself. She looked at me with a raised eyebrow.

I smiled at her and said, "Have a good night ma'am. You too Sandy, sir, Bobby."

Then I turned and left without another word.

Part of me wanted to turn back and make absolutely sure that little Sandy would be okay, but the smarter part knew that it would be weird. I had only known the Summers family for four days. In that sort amount of time I had apparently developed an overly strong relationship with their young daughter. I hadn't realized I had made such an impact on her. It would be best to distance myself from her and the Summers in general. If not only to maintain the acquaintance level relationship, than to deal with whatever was out there killing humans.

If I hadn't been so worried about the where the smell of blood was coming from I would have taken more than a glance up at the gorgeous night sky. But as I was afraid of what might be lurking out in the forest, all I did was find the moon. It was almost full. For a normal person a full moon in the sky is a god send. It allows the average-joe a reasonable level of vision where otherwise they would have none and be forced to rely on other means to navigate the darkness. For me it is actually somewhat of a detriment as it levels the playing field against beings like me who can see just fine with almost no light at all. As it was I had no trouble at all making my way down the dimly lit road back to my own campsite.

I paced swiftly and silently down the road for the few minutes it took me to get to my own campsite. Taking the corner around a copse of oaks into my campsite I paused. I saw everything as I had left it. My humvee was exactly where I'd parked it. The fire in the fire pit in the center of the dirt area was undisturbed. There was no one around. All was quiet and there were no foot prints or smells I didn't recognize. Even my hammock seemed entirely undisturbed. So when I opened the driver door of my oversized truck and heard a voice from 3 feet away I nearly jumped out of my boots.

"Fine night, is it not?" the voice was deep, pleasant and sophisticated.

God dam-it!" I cursed and turned to look at a frog the size of corgi sitting on the hood of the truck. I roared at him in a whisper remembering I could easily wake my neighbors, "Holy sister Mary Francis, Al! I almost blew you away. I had in fact drawn the Glock-17 from the shoulder holster inside my Carhartt.

Algernon, the frog prince, sat on the hood of my truck clothed in fine silk robes of deep burgundy, looking at me with a smirk of mild amusement. He guffawed at me and said, "You are jumpier than I am. What is wrong, Wild Thing?"

"You scared the crap out of me! That's what's wrong! Why do you keep doing that?" Why was he here? Did it have to do with whatever was going on out there?

"I am no sneak. If you had been paying attention you would have sensed that I was here." He turned up is nose, in mock indignation. "You're so preoccupied by what your nose is telling you that you've forgotten everything your new family taught you."

"No one is going to notice when you jump out of godforsaken nowhere!" I roared at him in whisper.

He used one webbed hand to adjust the folds of his robe. "Really, one would expect a beast with your eyes would be accustomed to the darkness. I mean really, it has been five, almost six years since you were changed."

I gave him a flat look. "What do you want, Algernon?"

"I've come for you," he said matter of factly, "You are quite the nuisance."

"What is that supposed to mean?" I said.

"You are always making me run about after you. I have to make sure that you aren't doing anything uncouth. The last thing I want is to be associated with a mortal who has no manners."

I looked at him uncomprehending. "Al, I don't have time for this."

"The Summer's family of course," he seemed to blurt it out. "Do not think just because they share the same name as that of our court we are in any way connected."

Algernon the frog was referring to the Court of Summer Fey. A court he was only distantly associated with, him being one of the Wild Fey. "I hadn't thought anything of the kind," I said, incredulous, "I was telling stories."

"You have ulterior motives. I have watched you humans for centuries! You never do anything for another unless it will bring you profit!" he said waggling a webbed hand at me.

"That's capitalism for you. Welcome to America," I said. I turned from him and felt around for the rear hatch release. I found it and gave it a yank and I heard the low thunk of the hatch mechanism's lock releasing. The way I see it the more mortals know about the magical world the better. Maybe, should the worst happen, they'll flinch in the right direction."

"Do not turn your back on me when I am speaking to you, Wild Thing! I am a Prince I demand to be treated as such!" he sounded angry, but I had dealt with him too many times to feel too threatened by him.

I walked and talked. "I don't care how tall your father is Al. Every man has to do his own growing. Besides, like I said, you're in America. We really do not understand the whole royalty-nobility thing. And you know what, I don't have time for one of your rambling conversations." I climbed into the back of my truck and pulled out the rifle case I was looking for.

"Very well Wild Thing. I have come to deliver a message and so I shall," he said.

This last part caught my attention. "A message? From who? And why do you keep calling me that?"

He raised his voice so I could hear inside the truck, though he really didn't need to. "The message is this, 'Do no favors for the sake of Summer, Wild Thing. If you are needed you shall be notified," he said. His tone was crisp as though he had made sure to memorize it well enough to repeat it word for word.

I paused in unpacking my M14. "What does that even mean? And again, why do you keep calling me Wild Thing? You don't say it like the song, you say it like it's my name. Are you insulting me?"

"It is what we call you now, Wild Thing. It is our name for you," he said.

"Well stop it. It's weird, and I already have a name."

"Yes. Yes, you do," he replied. "A name, for me, still incomplete, you still won't tell me your middle name. Even after all these years. You still don't trust me."

I finally decided to meet his gaze. It was awkward looking at him through the windshield. "Not at all. Especially, now that I know how important names are to y'all Fey folk and your magic." I lifted the battle rifle and checked it over. I made sure the chamber was empty and began inspecting its overall condition.

Al, seemed content to wait, for a while at least. "What a crude thing," he said. I looked down at the weapon.

The M14 was the United States military's last wood and steel rifle. It's powerful, stream-lined, reliable, and not to mention accurate over great distances; a good simple weapon. It's never once let me down. Yes it can spew its large bullets at a rate of 700 per minute, but it's designed for accuracy. It was made for a military that prized marksmanship. One that by and large, no longer exists in this day and age.

"What's wrong with it? It is a good simple weapon. You don't need more than this," I replied.

"It's a firearm, a coward's inelegant tool. Give me a blade!" he said. "One should stand and face his enemy."

I paused and glanced at him out the corner of my eye. Deciding to let the insult to my courage pass I said, "You can think what you want, Al. I know _who_ I am. Besides, a man like me hasn't much use for honor on the field."

"What does that mean?" he said.

"Bullets made with iron," I replied.

At this last comment Algernon the frog prince flinched. The Fey cannot abide the touch of iron. It is no secret among the supernatural community; the relationship between the fey and iron is to say the least, bad. Human's can't breathe water, the Fey cannot touch iron. We drown, they sublimate at the contact point.

"Yes, well there is nothing in that statement to refute my argument" he paused. "For quite some time now we have all been aware of your predilection for ruthlessness."

"Al, if you're just going to talk in circles the whole night you can leave. I have a corpse to find." I pulled an old canvas ammo belt out of one of the many metal ammo boxes I keep for storing things in. I started stuffing loaded magazines into its various pouches.

"How very rude!" he said with his chin in the air, "I am a prince! You haven't the right to simply dismiss me peasant. Why I should…"

"Al, either tell me what's going on out there, or leave me alone!" He looked startled at my interruption.

"What is it worth to you?" he asked. His tone was business like. "What are you going to give me in return? Will you free me of my life dept to you? Will you give me one of your names? I am not some lowly wood-sprite or sparkling fairy to be traded bread and milk for information. Wild _Thing_ , I know better. I know what is out there!" He made the word 'Thing' sound like it was meant to be an insult.

With a sigh I rocked the magazine into the rifle with the finesse of one who has done it countless times. I hopped down from the back the Humvee closed the hatch and tugged on it to make sure it was locked. Then I walked around to face the Frog Prince.

Without malice, or much emotion of any kind I said what simply came to mind "I've done this sort of thing before, I can do it again." I turned and locked up my truck.

With a silence befitting my predator's body I shot off into the woods.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter: 2

I ran through the night and my legs ate up the rough terrain as I paced through the tree's northward past the Summer's campsite and all the rest into the wilderness. The smell was in my head, calling me like a stray thought, into the next room. I had to stop at irregular intervals, pausing to navigate my way through the dense foliage so common to New York's forests. I passed trees of every variety, all of them huge, ancient and unknown to the world. I felt at home.

As I jogged on I noticed the smell was indeed getting stronger; leading me closer. It was a powerful odor. I couldn't even see the body and it was already filling my head causing me to have damning thoughts of drinking the blood of my own kind. I kept having to remind myself over and over what was for the past almost six years the only thing which had kept me from crossing the line. "It's not water…. It's not water… It's not water…"

It is hard for those who do not have the 'demon' that comes with vampirism. The voice in your head you aren't so sure isn't actually you own telling you in every conceivable way to drink… it's a near constant battle. To a vampire blood is what water is to the mortal human. It is the life sustaining liquid which allows a person to prolong their existence. I have not of my own free will partaken of the blood of a human. That solitary fact is what has allowed me to keep hold of my soul.

Suddenly, the smell of gore was too much and when I reached the rim of small depression in the forest floor I found out why. It was everywhere! I stepped down into the depression and I felt the searing pain of my binding marks blossom upon my skin. From my ankle to my face the black tribal tattoos of binding burgeoned across the right side of my body. I could see them on the back of my hand. They were both sharp and swirling. The warning spell was upon me. For a while I just stood amidst who ever this had been and stared at the back of my hand, fighting back the fog of need in my head. The battle against my need for blood was fierce and because of my own mental intensity, short.

"It's not water… It's not water…. It's not water…." I chanted under my breath.

I realized I was holding in a giant breath. I let it out quickly and forced myself to look for some clue. The blood was everywhere. Whatever had done this was incredibly thorough not to mention incredibly strong. Blood covered almost every inch of the shallow hole. Small chunks of flesh and broken bones littered the ground. There were shreds of fabric cast about in random locations; as if the person's clothes and be ripped to the smallest of pieces and cast into the air like confetti. It was as though the attacker was taken by a fit of obsessive compulsive inclination to spread as much of the person around as evenly as was possible. Imagine that, a vampire with O.C.D.

If not for the light of the moon, it would never have caught my eye so quickly. Sitting centrally placed amidst the gore on a small stone was the only thing completely clean of blood. It was a name plate, white letters set into a green background. It read, "Greg". Whoever or whatever had done this had set the man's name plate out as if to name the mess in the same way a curator of a museum does when labeling an exhibit. It made me shudder.

I quickly extricated myself from the mess, climbing up and out of the hole. I was torn between an urge to vomit at the sight of such horrors and the desire to go lick all the leaves clean of blood. My knees were weak, my hands were shaking, and I couldn't breathe. A voice inside my head sounding so much like my own screamed for me to take the drug, to be free, to claim what was left of my life. I gasped in breaths as deep as I could.

Gasp, "It's not water," gasp, "It's not water," gasp, "It's not water." I chanted to myself the seemingly endless mantra of my cursed life. Struggling to focus and regain some semblance of myself, I stood there counting the minutes I was conscious and silently praying I had not lost consciousness without knowing it. After some time I mastered myself once more and staggered up wind to reclaim the rest of my mind. I turned to look back at the hole.

Who or whatever had done this was no longer here. That basic fact begged the question, where was that perpetrator now? I had to find what had done this and kill it. It was my basic function as a member of the Fellowship of Saint Giles. I killed things that killed things. That's just what I am now a killer. Sometimes I liked to go along with what the other members called my kind, assassins. In truth I had, on more levels than one, no idea what I was. I shook my head. I would have time for navel gazing later, there was after all, killing to be done.

Standing I faced away from the pit, looking off into the darkness of the trees I tried to gather my thoughts. In this moment examining the details from memory made it easier to control myself and focus on the facts.

I had seen foot prints in the forest floor, they were below average in size, old type flat soled shoes with pointed toes and they were all in the same place. If the shoes were of the kind I thought they were then that meant the wearer had not planned on spending a great deal of time out the woods. One simply does not walk through the highlands of New York without the proper footwear if one can help it. There were no foot prints leading in or out of the place just a small circle where the ummm, worker, had stood, crouched and turned in place. That meant there had to be footprints nearby. Assuming whatever did this couldn't fly or go cross country through the trees like a mountain lion.

The search for more footprints was a short one and the sight of them unclenched something in my chest. At least this was something that behaved like a man. They lead up to and away from the place traversing the same path as they went. I mentally paced out about four yards from the jumping place to the center where the trampled circle was. So, whatever had done this was strong and agile. To have leaped so far carrying a man sized weight and stuck the landing was impressive. There was one other things these foot prints meant which was both comfort and worry. This creature walked like a human, it had the same psychotic tendencies as a human gone wrong. Certain patterns of behavior could be expected. On the upside I would know what to expect from such a creature. On the downside, I knew doing battle with such a thing would not be easy. It would be easiest to attack with the element of surprise.

The chill wind picked up and blew some of the warm out of my coat. I looked down at the tracks and resigned myself to what lay ahead of me. All I wanted was some time to myself, to drink beer, fish and read or whatever I wanted to do. Now I had to deal with this! Whatever it was. Probably some sort of psycho vampire. I started walking.

The trail was an easy one. Whoever had passed this way had apparently either not bothered to hide his trail or just didn't care if anyone would find it. The binding marks faded as I began my walk. I had begun to assert more control.

It made sense I suppose, not hiding anything. The location of the, ummm destruction of Greg was remote enough to eliminate any such attentions of the mortal authorities. If a man is torn into tiny pieces in the middle of a forest and no one is around to hear him scream, does he make a noise? Perhaps not enough of one because I never heard him. The pit might have had something to do with the sound, reflecting the sound waves up into the sky. My cursory examination of the scene had not been enough to determine whether or not Greg had been alive when he was murdered/disassembled. I hoped to God he hadn't been.

The trail led on off into the darkness and I followed it up the slope. I could tell by the distance between the footsteps my predecessor, they had slowed down just like I was. Finally I came to a steeper embankment that rose perhaps 20 yards up at a fairly steep angle of incline. I trudged up it and let out a groan once I had reached the top. It was a road. The trail ended here. I walked out to the middle of it. Either way I looked there was nothing to see but dense trees lining both sides of the road. Apart from a thin mist there was nothing to see, there weren't even any lines painted down the center of the narrow road. My heart sank.

How do you track a person along a paved road? The answer to that question is, you don't. There are no markings to speak of and no scents to follow. Such trails are all too faint for even the best of bloodhounds to search out. This meant a few things. The first, this person had a vehicle to get into. It could mean the person had left a vehicle to return to. I searched and found only the one set of tracks. This meant he had friends to come and pick him up. Or he simply walked down the road to where ever he wanted to go and departed from the road in either another direction or in a vehicle parked some distance away. This trail was cold. I could just go looking but such a task would take hours and it might ultimately turn up nothing.

In that moment Al came to mind. He knew what was going on here. He'd told me so himself. The first thing you learn about the fey is that they are dangerous. The second thing you learn is that they are literally incapable of lying. So what he had said was true. He knew what was up, out here.

I heaved a sigh and hoped to find Al still sitting on my truck when I returned. I would have to see if he was willing to bargain for information. I had to know what was going on!

My feet had just made the turn back towards my camp when an figure stepped from the tree line ahead of me. The first thing that I noticed was that he was glowing. It was a greenish glow, one that bespoke of summoned magical energies. He glowed as if his outline were made of aurora. At first he just stood there in his hunting leathers and feathers. I gaped at him confused as all hell. Then he raised his tomahawk and pointed it in my direction. Then the tree line blew up. Out from the shadows beneath trees came a line of charging braves. The angry ghosts of Native American warriors charged at me. I turned and ran. They gave chase, following me down the road westward and away from my campsite.

They screamed war-cries and brandished various weapons of ancient war at me. There is a distinct advantage I have over most people. I know when to run and I know when to fight. Truth be told I run just as much as I fight. This was one of those running times. I was not ready to fight ghosts.

After the initial shock of sudden and angry ghosts I started to think. It was hard however to do so while simultaneously preventing myself from squealing like a frightened piglet. Such noises just aren't manly and even here amidst no one but, little woodland creatures and the shades of long dead Iroquois warriors. I would not behave in such a manor.

A plan formed in my head. It took into consideration both things I knew for certain about ghosts. Ghosts moan a lot and, and I should stay away from them. The new plan was to run faster.

I ran and ran until I came to a fork in the road; it must have taken me a good 30 minutes. That entire time I hadn't any idea what I was supposed to do about the ghosts. I looked at the signs and took the one that indicated it lead to a highway. If I had to run until morning I would do it. I could do it. I could run all day. I turned right and booked it past the fork heading, now, down a slight slope towards the base of the mountain and in the direction of a main road. I ran on for a while and looked back to see if I was being followed still.

I wasn't.

I had turned-round just in time to see them take the other fork in the road. My first response to that sight was to be relieved. The second was to be slightly annoyed. After all that running, they weren't even chasing me. Naturally I wanted to know why. Where the hell were they going?

For a moment I didn't really believe what I was going to do; what I had to do. I was going to start chasing angry ghosts. There seemed to be some connection here. It's not every blue freaking moon you see a hoard of angry ghosts. My chest heaving, I stood there in disbelief. Then I gave a curse, readjusted my grip on my rifle and started off after the war party.

It didn't take long for me to realize the ridiculous nature of what was I was now a part of. I was chasing ghosts, angry Native American ghosts, down an abandoned road, in the middle of the night, in the mountains, armed to the teeth. Why, because I was looking for a psychotic killer who had both the strength, and inclination to tear apart a human into tiny little bits and scatter them in some disgusting macabre display no one was meant to see. What is wrong with my life!

The figures ahead of me charged down the road with the wild abandon one expects from a war party brandishing stone spears and tomahawks. Now that I wasn't focused on running to save my life, I could examine this strange phenomenon in more detail. I counted 17 men made of aurora borealis streak, silently now, across the landscape. They were not centered in the road, instead they were arrayed in single file almost in the ditch on the uphill side of the road. I counted 24 of them. Was this some ancient pathway paved over by and destroyed by modern society? I was inclined to believe so, especially when for no reason at all they broke left off into what looked like ordinary forest.

Leaping across the ditch I followed them once more into the trees. They lead me up and over a hill and into the small valley beyond. Looking up through the trees, I saw it. On the far side of the valley was a jagged cliff that, at my best guess was almost 900 feet tall. At the top was the light of a bonfire obscured by surrounding bushes and trees. It looked like someone had angered the ghosts. I slowed to a stop and stood there trying letting my legs get used to standing still. The next couple of minutes were spent trying to get a better view of the cliff top.

I squinted into the distance through the small gaps in the trees and canopy and tried to make sense of what I saw. The ghost warriors descended down into the valley, reaching the small river at the bottom they broke left traveling north upthe bank. Coming to a series of old rocks spanning the width of the flowing water they crossed. I briefly considered how odd that was. Why would ghosts have to find stepping stones? Perhaps the habits of the living are kept by the dead. In moments they had crossed the river and began a wide looping ascent around the jagged span of rock jutting out of the side of the mountain.

The braves had made the mountain top. I could only see them now through the distant foliage as individual streaking lights of changing spectral colors. They slowed to a stalk and seemed to fan out around what I assumed was a camp around the bonfire. They crept forward, seemingly finding their respective positions for an attack. Without any visible signal I could see, they sprang upon the camp. I could no longer see them as they passed beyond my vision over the edge of the cliff. War-cries ended abruptly with accompanying bursts of white light. The attack had been, defeated, I assumed. I couldn't see. I couldn't hear or smell or feel anything that might give me some kind of clue as to what had happened up on that foreboding patch of earth.

I waited several minutes standing fast my watch, eyes wide searching for any sign of movement and listening for any sound. There was nothing. Tension built in my stomach until I could bear it no longer. It was a strange uncomfortable feeling like you wanted some tedious task to be over an to come to conclusion but simply refused to. There was no aftermath, no descent from the climax.

I turned away and leaned my back against an old pine and sank to the forest floor. There was a knot in my chest the size of my fist. There was magic here, and it scared me. Magic, the fundamental forces of the universe and creation, was being used for some unknown purpose across the valley. Why? Why the ghosts? Why the fire? Why here and why now? I had no answers to any of those questions. I did know I had to find out. I wasn't going to face whatever was up there as I was now, ignorant and alone. Facing an entirely unknown enemy alone was not wise. I had to know my enemy. Where they even my enemy? I would have to find some way to get more information. Who did I call? I didn't know anyone had such knowledge. I could call get in touch with the network and they could find someone who could help; assuming I could reach them way out here.

I turned and started back to the campground. There was no cell service out here. The radio in my Humvee was a no go, at least I wasn't prepared to risk what it took to get a signal out to the right people. The mountains would screw with the signal. I guess I could just call. Though calling seemed like a bad idea. You never knew who was listening to public lines. Using hard-lines that were not for certain secure had harmed us before. This was not a conversation I wanted over heard. It was the only way. I just hoped it wouldn't, wouldn't what? I didn't even know how bad things could get. That, most of all, worried me now. Most of the time, I could at least predict how deep the shit was. After I had made up my mind, the trip back to my campsite was a jog and anxious worrying. I had never been this isolated before.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter: 2

I ran through the night and my legs ate up the rough terrain as I paced through the tree's northward past the Summer's campsite and all the rest into the wilderness. The smell was in my head, calling me like a stray thought, into the next room. I had to stop at irregular intervals, pausing to navigate my way through the dense foliage so common to New York's forests. I passed trees of every variety, all of them huge, ancient and unknown to the world. I felt at home.

As I jogged on I noticed the smell was indeed getting stronger; leading me closer. It was a powerful odor. I couldn't even see the body and it was already filling my head causing me to have damning thoughts of drinking the blood of my own kind. I kept having to remind myself over and over what was for the past almost six years the only thing which had kept me from crossing the line. "It's not water…. It's not water… It's not water…"

It is hard for those who do not have the 'demon' that comes with vampirism. The voice in your head you aren't so sure isn't actually you own telling you in every conceivable way to drink… it's a near constant battle. To a vampire blood is what water is to the mortal human. It is the life sustaining liquid which allows a person to prolong their existence. I have not of my own free will partaken of the blood of a human. That solitary fact is what has allowed me to keep hold of my soul.

Suddenly, the smell of gore was too much and when I reached the rim of small depression in the forest floor I found out why. It was everywhere! I stepped down into the depression and I felt the searing pain of my binding marks blossom upon my skin. From my ankle to my face the black tribal tattoos of binding burgeoned across the right side of my body. I could see them on the back of my hand. They were both sharp and swirling. The warning spell was upon me. For a while I just stood amidst who ever this had been and stared at the back of my hand, fighting back the fog of need in my head. The battle against my need for blood was fierce and because of my own mental intensity, short.

"It's not water… It's not water…. It's not water…." I chanted under my breath.

I realized I was holding in a giant breath. I let it out quickly and forced myself to look for some clue. The blood was everywhere. Whatever had done this was incredibly thorough not to mention incredibly strong. Blood covered almost every inch of the shallow hole. Small chunks of flesh and broken bones littered the ground. There were shreds of fabric cast about in random locations; as if the person's clothes and be ripped to the smallest of pieces and cast into the air like confetti. It was as though the attacker was taken by a fit of obsessive compulsive inclination to spread as much of the person around as evenly as was possible. Imagine that, a vampire with O.C.D.

If not for the light of the moon, it would never have caught my eye so quickly. Sitting centrally placed amidst the gore on a small stone was the only thing completely clean of blood. It was a name plate, white letters set into a green background. It read, "Greg". Whoever or whatever had done this had set the man's name plate out as if to name the mess in the same way a curator of a museum does when labeling an exhibit. It made me shudder.

I quickly extricated myself from the mess, climbing up and out of the hole. I was torn between an urge to vomit at the sight of such horrors and the desire to go lick all the leaves clean of blood. My knees were weak, my hands were shaking, and I couldn't breathe. A voice inside my head sounding so much like my own screamed for me to take the drug, to be free, to claim what was left of my life. I gasped in breaths as deep as I could.

Gasp, "It's not water," gasp, "It's not water," gasp, "It's not water." I chanted to myself the seemingly endless mantra of my cursed life. Struggling to focus and regain some semblance of myself, I stood there counting the minutes I was conscious and silently praying I had not lost consciousness without knowing it. After some time I mastered myself once more and staggered up wind to reclaim the rest of my mind. I turned to look back at the hole.

Who or whatever had done this was no longer here. That basic fact begged the question, where was that perpetrator now? I had to find what had done this and kill it. It was my basic function as a member of the Fellowship of Saint Giles. I killed things that killed things. That's just what I am now a killer. Sometimes I liked to go along with what the other members called my kind, assassins. In truth I had, on more levels than one, no idea what I was. I shook my head. I would have time for navel gazing later, there was after all, killing to be done.

Standing I faced away from the pit, looking off into the darkness of the trees I tried to gather my thoughts. In this moment examining the details from memory made it easier to control myself and focus on the facts.

I had seen foot prints in the forest floor, they were below average in size, old type flat soled shoes with pointed toes and they were all in the same place. If the shoes were of the kind I thought they were then that meant the wearer had not planned on spending a great deal of time out the woods. One simply does not walk through the highlands of New York without the proper footwear if one can help it. There were no foot prints leading in or out of the place just a small circle where the ummm, worker, had stood, crouched and turned in place. That meant there had to be footprints nearby. Assuming whatever did this couldn't fly or go cross country through the trees like a mountain lion.

The search for more footprints was a short one and the sight of them unclenched something in my chest. At least this was something that behaved like a man. They lead up to and away from the place traversing the same path as they went. I mentally paced out about four yards from the jumping place to the center where the trampled circle was. So, whatever had done this was strong and agile. To have leaped so far carrying a man sized weight and stuck the landing was impressive. There was one other things these foot prints meant which was both comfort and worry. This creature walked like a human, it had the same psychotic tendencies as a human gone wrong. Certain patterns of behavior could be expected. On the upside I would know what to expect from such a creature. On the downside, I knew doing battle with such a thing would not be easy. It would be easiest to attack with the element of surprise.

The chill wind picked up and blew some of the warm out of my coat. I looked down at the tracks and resigned myself to what lay ahead of me. All I wanted was some time to myself, to drink beer, fish and read or whatever I wanted to do. Now I had to deal with this! Whatever it was. Probably some sort of psycho vampire. I started walking.

The trail was an easy one. Whoever had passed this way had apparently either not bothered to hide his trail or just didn't care if anyone would find it. The binding marks faded as I began my walk. I had begun to assert more control.

It made sense I suppose, not hiding anything. The location of the, ummm destruction of Greg was remote enough to eliminate any such attentions of the mortal authorities. If a man is torn into tiny pieces in the middle of a forest and no one is around to hear him scream, does he make a noise? Perhaps not enough of one because I never heard him. The pit might have had something to do with the sound, reflecting the sound waves up into the sky. My cursory examination of the scene had not been enough to determine whether or not Greg had been alive when he was murdered/disassembled. I hoped to God he hadn't been.

The trail led on off into the darkness and I followed it up the slope. I could tell by the distance between the footsteps my predecessor, they had slowed down just like I was. Finally I came to a steeper embankment that rose perhaps 20 yards up at a fairly steep angle of incline. I trudged up it and let out a groan once I had reached the top. It was a road. The trail ended here. I walked out to the middle of it. Either way I looked there was nothing to see but dense trees lining both sides of the road. Apart from a thin mist there was nothing to see, there weren't even any lines painted down the center of the narrow road. My heart sank.

How do you track a person along a paved road? The answer to that question is, you don't. There are no markings to speak of and no scents to follow. Such trails are all too faint for even the best of bloodhounds to search out. This meant a few things. The first, this person had a vehicle to get into. It could mean the person had left a vehicle to return to. I searched and found only the one set of tracks. This meant he had friends to come and pick him up. Or he simply walked down the road to where ever he wanted to go and departed from the road in either another direction or in a vehicle parked some distance away. This trail was cold. I could just go looking but such a task would take hours and it might ultimately turn up nothing.

In that moment Al came to mind. He knew what was going on here. He'd told me so himself. The first thing you learn about the fey is that they are dangerous. The second thing you learn is that they are literally incapable of lying. So what he had said was true. He knew what was up, out here.

I heaved a sigh and hoped to find Al still sitting on my truck when I returned. I would have to see if he was willing to bargain for information. I had to know what was going on!

My feet had just made the turn back towards my camp when an figure stepped from the tree line ahead of me. The first thing that I noticed was that he was glowing. It was a greenish glow, one that bespoke of summoned magical energies. He glowed as if his outline were made of aurora. At first he just stood there in his hunting leathers and feathers. I gaped at him confused as all hell. Then he raised his tomahawk and pointed it in my direction. Then the tree line blew up. Out from the shadows beneath trees came a line of charging braves. The angry ghosts of Native American warriors charged at me. I turned and ran. They gave chase, following me down the road westward and away from my campsite.

They screamed war-cries and brandished various weapons of ancient war at me. There is a distinct advantage I have over most people. I know when to run and I know when to fight. Truth be told I run just as much as I fight. This was one of those running times. I was not ready to fight ghosts.

After the initial shock of sudden and angry ghosts I started to think. It was hard however to do so while simultaneously preventing myself from squealing like a frightened piglet. Such noises just aren't manly and even here amidst no one but, little woodland creatures and the shades of long dead Iroquois warriors. I would not behave in such a manor.

A plan formed in my head. It took into consideration both things I knew for certain about ghosts. Ghosts moan a lot and, and I should stay away from them. The new plan was to run faster.

I ran and ran until I came to a fork in the road; it must have taken me a good 30 minutes. That entire time I hadn't any idea what I was supposed to do about the ghosts. I looked at the signs and took the one that indicated it lead to a highway. If I had to run until morning I would do it. I could do it. I could run all day. I turned right and booked it past the fork heading, now, down a slight slope towards the base of the mountain and in the direction of a main road. I ran on for a while and looked back to see if I was being followed still.

I wasn't.

I had turned-round just in time to see them take the other fork in the road. My first response to that sight was to be relieved. The second was to be slightly annoyed. After all that running, they weren't even chasing me. Naturally I wanted to know why. Where the hell were they going?

For a moment I didn't really believe what I was going to do; what I had to do. I was going to start chasing angry ghosts. There seemed to be some connection here. It's not every blue freaking moon you see a hoard of angry ghosts. My chest heaving, I stood there in disbelief. Then I gave a curse, readjusted my grip on my rifle and started off after the war party.

It didn't take long for me to realize the ridiculous nature of what was I was now a part of. I was chasing ghosts, angry Native American ghosts, down an abandoned road, in the middle of the night, in the mountains, armed to the teeth. Why, because I was looking for a psychotic killer who had both the strength, and inclination to tear apart a human into tiny little bits and scatter them in some disgusting macabre display no one was meant to see. What is wrong with my life!

The figures ahead of me charged down the road with the wild abandon one expects from a war party brandishing stone spears and tomahawks. Now that I wasn't focused on running to save my life, I could examine this strange phenomenon in more detail. I counted 17 men made of aurora borealis streak, silently now, across the landscape. They were not centered in the road, instead they were arrayed in single file almost in the ditch on the uphill side of the road. I counted 24 of them. Was this some ancient pathway paved over by and destroyed by modern society? I was inclined to believe so, especially when for no reason at all they broke left off into what looked like ordinary forest.

Leaping across the ditch I followed them once more into the trees. They lead me up and over a hill and into the small valley beyond. Looking up through the trees, I saw it. On the far side of the valley was a jagged cliff that, at my best guess was almost 900 feet tall. At the top was the light of a bonfire obscured by surrounding bushes and trees. It looked like someone had angered the ghosts. I slowed to a stop and stood there trying letting my legs get used to standing still. The next couple of minutes were spent trying to get a better view of the cliff top.

I squinted into the distance through the small gaps in the trees and canopy and tried to make sense of what I saw. The ghost warriors descended down into the valley, reaching the small river at the bottom they broke left traveling north upthe bank. Coming to a series of old rocks spanning the width of the flowing water they crossed. I briefly considered how odd that was. Why would ghosts have to find stepping stones? Perhaps the habits of the living are kept by the dead. In moments they had crossed the river and began a wide looping ascent around the jagged span of rock jutting out of the side of the mountain.

The braves had made the mountain top. I could only see them now through the distant foliage as individual streaking lights of changing spectral colors. They slowed to a stalk and seemed to fan out around what I assumed was a camp around the bonfire. They crept forward, seemingly finding their respective positions for an attack. Without any visible signal I could see, they sprang upon the camp. I could no longer see them as they passed beyond my vision over the edge of the cliff. War-cries ended abruptly with accompanying bursts of white light. The attack had been, defeated, I assumed. I couldn't see. I couldn't hear or smell or feel anything that might give me some kind of clue as to what had happened up on that foreboding patch of earth.

I waited several minutes standing fast my watch, eyes wide searching for any sign of movement and listening for any sound. There was nothing. Tension built in my stomach until I could bear it no longer. It was a strange uncomfortable feeling like you wanted some tedious task to be over an to come to conclusion but simply refused to. There was no aftermath, no descent from the climax.

I turned away and leaned my back against an old pine and sank to the forest floor. There was a knot in my chest the size of my fist. There was magic here, and it scared me. Magic, the fundamental forces of the universe and creation, was being used for some unknown purpose across the valley. Why? Why the ghosts? Why the fire? Why here and why now? I had no answers to any of those questions. I did know I had to find out. I wasn't going to face whatever was up there as I was now, ignorant and alone. Facing an entirely unknown enemy alone was not wise. I had to know my enemy. Where they even my enemy? I would have to find some way to get more information. Who did I call? I didn't know anyone had such knowledge. I could call get in touch with the network and they could find someone who could help; assuming I could reach them way out here.

I turned and started back to the campground. There was no cell service out here. The radio in my Humvee was a no go, at least I wasn't prepared to risk what it took to get a signal out to the right people. The mountains would screw with the signal. I guess I could just call. Though calling seemed like a bad idea. You never knew who was listening to public lines. Using hard-lines that were not for certain secure had harmed us before. This was not a conversation I wanted over heard. It was the only way. I just hoped it wouldn't, wouldn't what? I didn't even know how bad things could get. That, most of all, worried me now. Most of the time, I could at least predict how deep the shit was. After I had made up my mind, the trip back to my campsite was a jog and anxious worrying. I had never been this isolated before.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

It was the cold that woke me. Shivering and shacking I fought my way back to something like consciousness. At first it was only me and the cold, but a few minutes later I heard a voice nearby.

"What is the master so upset for? He was just a mortal. He could not have survived that fall."

"It is not our place to question the Master, Bingham. We are to find him, and make certain he is dead. We will search for as long as it takes. The Master wants a body found, burned and buried deep within the earth. If he is not dead as the master suspects then we are to finish him." This second man spoke perfect English but with a strong Latino accent.

"There is no way he survived that fall. With how he must have fallen, I wouldn't be surprised if we found bits of him instead. Besides, you can't believe that he wasn't dead before he fell. Redman could not have missed the shot. Not from that distance. The guy was even standing still."

"Stop whining!" the Latino man nearly shouted. "It is not your place to ask questions. The Master's word is absolute. And besides, if he is alive he will hear us. Be quiet."

The sound of their footsteps faded to nothing as they walked further down the river. I lay there trying to stay as still as possible, fighting off the waves of shaking. Finally, I decided to let my body have its way and convulsed for a few minutes. Shaking when you are cold is your body's response against that cold. It doesn't work very well but, it can help a little towards warming you. In that moment I knew that I had to get warm or I'd die…. or worse, I'd lose it. The tattoo was beginning to appear again on my skin warning me of my rising demon. I could only hope to die. I would rather die than to lose the battle against the hunger for blood. Controlling my state of mind was paramount. Who knows who I could hurt out here.

I tried to get up but when I moved my arm it didn't respond and when I shifted it flopped around like it would never again answer my calls to action. It was entirely numb. All things considered I found that numbness a good thing. I preferred it over the pain I would soon feel. I squirmed deeper into the hole and struggled into the fetal position attempting to stay warm. Now resting on frozen mud, I tried to sort things out.

Who was I? Where was I? Who wanted me dead? Why did they want me dead? Where was my rifle? Why the hell is my boot missing.

My mind was a fog bank, sluggish and distracted. Pain, confusion and, I are all old friends but it was not that often we were this close. When I realized we were together again I knew what to do. I had to focus. I felt around for something to hold on to and pulled myself deeper into the hole with rocky hand hold and tried to snuggle up against the dirt.

Old habits from an A.D.D. youth kicked in and fought through my own racing thoughts for control of my brain. "Start with what I know!"

I knew I was in a hole. That was a start. I knew I had fallen a long, long, way and I knew I was in pain. My arm flopped, useless, as I examined myself. My shoulder was broken. Check that it was shattered. I couldn't bring myself to look at it right now but it felt somehow lower than the other one. All of it felt that way, smushed.

"Time to consider what had made me fall. I had been hit by something and it had knocked me off a cliff. I'd been hit in the head."

I touched the place where I'd been hit and triggered the most nauseating pain I'd had in my life. There was blood on my hand. Whatever had hit me had done it with enough concentrated force to tear open my skill. How bad was it? I touched it again and felt a shallow furrow along the side of my skull. The bone was showing and gouged. This was a gunshot wound. I'd been grazed by a large caliber bullet.

Someone was hunting me. How had they known I was here? Where was Emily? She should have been in the van! Had they found the van? Was she safe? I had to help her. I forced down the pain as I moved to crawl out that god forsaken hole. I had to find her. We were going to be married this summer. If they had hurt her... I would do something I wouldn't be proud of.

Finally, extricating myself from the hole I stood up straight to get a look at my surroundings. As I did so my body emitted several loud pops and cracks. I heard the two loudest echo back to me from the forest. Leaning back wincing against the new pains I heaved with anger and fear. With every beat of my heart my vision pulsed towards blackness. With a cyclic pattern the edges of my vision closed in upon my sight and faded back into place Out of the corner of my eye I saw my destination. The cliff face I had climbed was about a couple miles or so upstream. Off to the west the sun was getting ready to pass below the mountains. The loss of sunlight would not be good for my condition. The mountains would get even colder and even now I could see my breath. Not to mention its cleansing light would no longer aid me in keeping my demon at bay. Bare foot, I started walking towards my truck. The began to bloom across my skin. I could see them appearing on the back of my hand again. The demon in me was rising and so was the hunger for human blood that came with it.

As the sun began to pass below the mountains to the west my clothes stiffened. The water still left in the fibers was freezing. It was going to be a cold night. This was an advantage for me because the men hunting me were going to periodically focus on staying warm. They would not be focusing on their surroundings and therefore not on my approach. I slowed to a silent pace and listened hard for my enemy. The leaves hadn't fallen yet and the forest was still fleshed out with dying leaves and painted with their dusky colors. My ears would reveal them before my sight would. One of the upsides to being part vicious predator is the heightened sense of hearing. I noticed that the birds were being abnormally quiet. I was close…. to something.

Using the arm I could still move I reached awkwardly for my ka bar knife. The knife was familiar in my left, though I preferred using it with my right. I silently lamented the state of my right arm. Not having both hands was going to make what I was going to do more difficult and tried not to think about it.

"Do you think he'll be stupid enough?" the whiner's voice from earlier came drifting through the trees.

"Stupid enough to what?" said a voice that was not from earlier. (There were at least three of them now.)

"To come back here," said the whiner. "I mean he's gotta know. That we'll be waitin for him here, I mean." He spat something into the dirt.

"He'll be here. It looks like everything he owns is in that there." I crept closer. I could feel the stiffness of oak leaves and twigs in my toes.

"If he's smart he'll stay away. Probably, long gone by now," said the whiner. I made my way up closer to the clearing. There was a semicircle made of dense holly bushes around the clearing. They weren't tall enough to hide my six foot frame from them standing up so as I climbed the last of the slope to the edge of holly I crouch to stay out of sight. I sat just out of sight and listened.

"Doubt it. We've got his entire life in that vehicle. He'll either come up here to find his stuff or go back to his vehicle." At his comment I skipped a breath. Rage erupted inside me and I decided to risk it. Cautiously, slowly, steadily, I crept into the wall of holly bushes hugging the ground as I went. I lay there, silently surveying the scene. There was four men, all of them armed.

A dark haired man was crouching over the a small fire pit, smoking. (Idiot, cigarettes kill your sense of smell) He held an assault rifle, a military grade Ak-47. I could see the selector switch; it was set on full auto. Another man, blonde with a scruffy beard was crouching over a compass he had laid on the ground. He too had an assault rifle. At the other end of the clearing facing the direction I had originally come from was another pair of men. These two were wearing baseball caps, sunglasses and one of them wore a turtleneck shirt.

"So who is this guy anyway?" The man by the fire pit had asked the question after a long pull on his cigarette. They were the harsh cheap'o kind. I could smell them from where I lay, a distance of some 40 feet.

"No idea," said the new voice. It was the man crouching over the compass. "Some guy the master wants dead."

The man from before, the one who spoke like a leader said from across the clearing. "His name is of no consequence. We were told he was a dark haired, dark eyed young man in his mid twenties. We are to kill him before his name becomes worth the notice of anyone."

I readied myself to kill them.

I had to wait until one of them was alone. Then I'd use the wire saw I kept hidden in a keychain. Then I'd have a gun.

I lay there for almost half an hour fighting off the sudden swelling urges to feast on their flesh. My mind was fogging up again. The stupid one groaned and said something about the bathroom. I was on the move, slinking soundlessly through the underbrush around the clearing. I tried not to drag my useless arm across the ground as I maneuvered myself with my three remaining useful limbs.

"I'll only be a second," he called back.

I was closer now. He was walking too far away from the group. It was a distance much further than was in any way wise. The amateur was separating himself from the group. This was going to be easy. I could smell him on the breeze; he stank of body odor and cigarettes. He'd missed a belt loop. Idiot, it's time to thin the herd.

He never heard me as I maneuvered through the foliage. My prey was before me. He tucked his assault rifle behind his back and assumed one of the most vulnerable positions any man can be in. I stepped from behind my hiding place wire saw hanging looped in my one good hand. 4 paces. 3 paces. 2 paces. Not a sound. I struck. The wire saw went around his neck and with one deft motion I wrenched it across his neck. But he did not buckle as he was supposed to. He let out a gurgle of pain. In my astonishment he'd gotten his hand between the saw and his throat.

He let out a literally strangled yell, "GLLAAAAHH."

"Fuck!" I growled, now his friends would know I was here. No use being quiet now.

We were close now. He was pressed up against me and I was forcing the back of his head forward with my own brow. He struggled against the wire. His free hand scrambled about as he tried to simultaneously find ways to fight me off and to regain his ability to breath.

"Greeahh!," I rocked my shoulders back and forth heaving against the wire. The razors twisted into the length of the wire found their bloody way through the knuckles of his hand and into the soft flesh of his throat. It's so intimate killing this close; and utterly satisfying when the thirst is on me.

His knees buckled and we went down to a crouch together. I was familiar with this part, he'd squirm some more. I briefly contemplated taking off his head the rest of the way with the saw. I'd never done it before, I was sure I could do it; I was just interested in how long it would take me. Later, perhaps.

I was aware of the fact that my time was running out. His friends had no doubt heard his gurgled shout. He was still dying and struggled against my touch when I went to take his gun. He swatted at me with his last remaining efforts. I turned his head and kneeled down on his temple, holding him pinned in place I unclipped the AK 47 from his harness. I invaded his pouches for more magazines and took several of the banana shaped things and stuffed them into various pockets of my remaining clothing. He was so vulnerable in that position. Aww gawwwd, the smell of blood…my mouth watered, my marks burned. The smell…..

An angry buzz whipped past my ear and I heard the report of a gunshot. I turned to look back up the hill and sure enough there were figures rushing through the trees in my direction. One stopped and took aim and there was another bark of gun fire. More air ripping sounds passed me. Anger erupted in me. How dare they! They would die for this insolence. I stalked forward staggering half a step later as a wave of bodily pain swept over me. The center pair of attackers were slowing down while the two on the sides were speeding up. They were trying to surround me. Shrugging off the building burden of pain and put my legs to work escaping the closing net. I ran to the left of the oncoming killers.

Another burst of gun fire rang through the forest. One of the bullets grazed my right calf and I felt my own blood start to run down over my foot. I raised the assault rifle in a one handed grip as I ran and let off a few rounds of my own in the direction of the closest enemy. To my surprise he went down flailing. Three left, for now at least. My other prey open fired, this time all together. I dove behind a thick oak tree to avoid being punched full of holes.

"You stand no chance!" called the one who sounded in-charge. "I don't know how a mere human like you survived that fall but you will never survive this. Surrender and we will end your pain quickly."

The other two gave jeers, shouts of agreement and approval. I said nothing. I couldn't really think of anything to say. I never was much for word battles with bullies. I usually ignored them or if I couldn't then I let my fists do the talking. It's hard coming up with stuff to say when you're half dead and the other half is vampire. Besides they thought I was normal. There was no sense in letting them think otherwise.

Their footsteps coming closer crunched through the leaves as they approached. I didn't know why they were hunting me, or how they had even found me. I was in deep. Where was everybody? Where was Emily? I had to find them!

A wave of nausea swept over me without warning. It was like being sea-sick, car-sick, and spun around all at once. The mental barriers I had put in place against the pain were beginning to fail. I had to focus.

I had flanked them and now they were coming at me in a column. I took up a position behind the big tree. Laying on my back I pulled my left leg over the right and made a make shift brace for the fore end of the gun. Not the most advisable shooting stance but when your arm doesn't work you make do with what you have. I pulled out the other magazines, put them in a place easy to reach with my one good hand, and waited for them to come for me. It was all I could do.

Peering around the edge of the oak I could see two figures among the thin bushes. They pushed steadily through the thin branches coming closer. I could only see two of them. I couldn't tell which ones. Where was the other one? If I fired I would reveal my position and the third would find me.

But they were closer now; about 30 yards away. They would see me soon and I'd have no choice but to shoot. Closer now, 25 yards. Eyes scanning for me one finally saw me and with a jolt of recognition he raised his rifle to kill me. He was too slow. I already had him in my sights and opened fire. I let loose a quick 3 round burst and before my target hit the ground I had re-aimed and fired on his partner.

Even from where I lay I could tell the two men were dead. I had aimed center mass on the pair of them, but the muzzle climb on an AK-47 is substantial. I felt only a brief sense of calm upon coming the conclusion that I had killed them. It did not last however. When I realized that I wasn't done, I immediately began to worry about where the other had gone.

What could I do though? I had no idea where to even start. I had heard stories about stand offs like this in the days of the Wild West. Cowboys and Natives would get into stalemates just like I was in and they would have to out wait their enemy or be shot moving from cover. I would have to wait. Being a half-turned vampire I was graced with heightened senses. I have exceptional hearing even among my own kind. I decided to put it to use now and wait for whatever would come. Quietly, I repositioned myself so that my back was against the tree and could look around from a sitting position. I waited, but not for long. My mind was at the end of its ability to block out pain. The waves of agony consumed me along with the spins, and nausea. My arm and shoulder screamed, as did the rest of my body. I vomited, all over myself. That was when I was when my left knee was blown to bits and among all the other pains and mind fogging stimuli I heard a gunshot.

A shadow passed over me and I looked up between retches to see the leader of my enemy standing over me and the swift approach of a something hard. There was a white flash and, I blacked out.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

"Well, he's not human," said a voice.

"No shit," laughed another. "He's a fucking mess."

I lay in an awkward pile with my crushed shoulder beneath me. My entire body was almost completely numb. It was as if my nervous system had decided to simply reject reality and in that moment I decided to be thankful for it. Especially, when the hard toe of a boot plowed into my stomach and threw me over onto my back. I was too confused to feel pain and struggled to even recognize my own existence. Suddenly, more voices started speaking and I couldn't concentrate on one long enough to distinguish it from any of the others. They were just intangible snippets of dialog I knew did not belong to me.

"Is he dead?"

"Why don't you check?"

"You do it. I ain't touching him, after that story."

"He killed three of us after falling off a cliff. The master is going to want to see him."

"What do you think he is?"

"He's fellowship. Has to be."

"Those fuckers are like the energizer bunny man. But I ain't never heard of one of them stayed breathin' after this much."

Fear mounted in me. I am not afraid to say it, and do not care if anyone thinks less of me for it either. I was hurt, helpless and out of ideas. I wanted to cry and would have it I'd had the energy for it. Through the haze came reason to combat the fear. Some small section of my consciousness stood apart and observed the pitiful thing that was also me from an objective perspective. "You can't cry," it said. "They think you're dead. You'll give yourself away." I cursed at the thought; rejected it. If I wanted to cry I would. Let them kill me and end it all. I should have died a long time ago when that damned vampire bit me. I was nothing now. I had nothing and only the prospect of NOTHING.

Another boot came flying in to slam into my ribs again. This kick too, toppled me over and I landed with my face pressed against something smooth. It smelled like warm rubber. "He's dead. He's rag-dolling every time I kick him."

In that moment I decided to risk it. I opened one of my eyes ever so slightly. Several raised alpha-numeric symbols stood out against a black background. They were not aligned in a straight pattern as would normally written symbols would be but curved upward at both ends in a slight arc. I stared at the numbers and letters for at least a solid minute before it hit me. They comprised the identification code for the tires of my humvee. I remember because they cost me a fortune. My humvee was right in front of my face. If I could just get inside it and get my hands on a gun, I would have a chance. A sudden body wide throb of pain brought on a moment of self evaluation and punctured the inflating hope to the empty thing it really was.

More throbs of pain coursed through me as my body seemed to force itself to start working again. They came with every beat of my heart. A moan escaped my lips. Immediately, all the men who had walked away stopped talking. Footsteps crossed the distance and came to where I lay. I shut my eye.

I was poked by something hard in the kidney and again only harder. "Hey, you fucker… you alive or what?"

I said nothing. In response to my silence he started kicking me over and over again in the back. With each impact upon my back a wave of mind altering pain racked my body and incrementally, anger replaced fear.

The man in charge spoke, "Stop fucking around! Shoot him in the head and be done with it."

"Won't the master want to question him?" said the man standing over me.

The man answered, "He'll be dead by night fall. Just kill him now and we can stop worrying about it."

"A'ight" said the man above me. "What ev'a."

The sound of AK-47's bolt being racked is a distinctive one. It was the trigger. I turned over looked the man in the face, took in his astonishment with malicious glee. Grabbing the gun by the barrel I wrenched it from his hands. He staggered backward, I shot him. The others in the corner

New pain in my legs woke me and gorgeous dark haired woman stood before me running her long sharp nails down the length of my shins slicing into the flesh. She had been cackling and smiling. Then she fell and there was a big frog and then I blacked out.

Chapter 6

This time I awoke to the smell of cooking bacon and wood-smoke. I opened my eyes and cast about for the source of olfactory goodness, but as I was chained to the front areal lift points of my humvee with heavy shackles my point of view was limited. For a few seconds I hadn't remembered any of my problems but when the part of my brain that keeps track of that stuff woke up too… life just got worse.

"He liiiives," called a familiar voice past a familiar cigar.

"Pops, is that you?" I said. "What's going on?"

"Heh!" he laughed. "You tell me." He walked around to the side of the humvee and leaned against it.

Pops, Isaac Elder, is a large man; tall and broad; about six feet two inches. He has immobile slicked back silver hair and a Spanish mustache of the same color. He wore a green bowling shirt, kakis, brown leather shoes and that same amused smile.

"What the hell, man?" I said not expecting a response as I looked around me. I found with my eyes the bodies of the men I had killed and a vampire's corpse at my feet.

Pops to the cigar out of his mouth flicked it, "You took the words right out of my mouth kiddo. How are you Nate?" He had raised his eyebrows and was giving me an appraising look.

My response was, "Fine, I think," but the look on my face that told him I wasn't.

"Nate, I had no choice. I hadn't planned on it. You were going to die."

He didn't have to explain, I knew what he meant by _it_. He had fed me blood when I was blacked out. He had saved my life; kept me from dying. A half-turned vampire can be healed of any injury with enough blood; so long as it is consumed unconsciously and enough of the person's soul remains.

I looked down staring at the hood of the truck I was chained to. "It wasn't your choice, to make."

"You were going to die!" he argued.

"You fed me at the expense of my soul!" I screamed at him"

"Nate, look…" he said. I cut him off and didn't let him finish.

"You gambled with my immortal soul! It's only been three months since the last time!"

The risk every half-vampire takes when being "fed" is the depletion of his or her soul. The curse of the vampire is a complicated thing. It does things to a bitten person's body. It makes us stronger, faster, and heightens the senses. The healing though, comes at a cost. Not only does it require the blood of a mortal but the physical change eats at the soul of the person being changed. There is no way to tell if there is enough soul left to complete the healing, every "feeding" is a risk. It is commonly believed that feedings should separated by at least a year of active life. If the soul is depleted the person dies, simply ceases to be, they do not move on to the afterlife, there is nothing left to move on.

"You were going to die," he argued. "When I got here I found you like… like you were and I- had to do something. There wasn't any blood on you mouth so…." He trailed off.

"You came to kill me…" I said. "You were surprised when you got here…" I couldn't keep the tones of realization out of my voice as I spoke. He had come not to save me, but to put me out of my misery.

"Like a rabid dog," he said, referring to the policy of killing members of the Fellowship who lose control and drink blood willingly.

I strained against my bonds, heaving at the immobile weight of the truck. I wanted to move, to walk around, to just DO SOMETHNG!

"You could have destroyed me!" I roared at him again.

He shook a finger at me, "You never would have been in this situation if you'd stayed put like you were told!"

I ignored him, "Gone, Pops! Gone. Nothing left. Nothing to move on, after. Nothing for St. Peter to welcome at the gates!"

"YOU OWE MEEE!" he shouted back. "YOU OWE US!" Breathing hard he tamed his temper. "We gave you your chance Nate, your chance at revenge. Your chance at a new life. Your training… All the chances you still have."

I just looked at him all sorts of emotion flowing through me so hard and fast I couldn't handle it. I hated, loved, resented and was grateful all at once. I just scowled at the steel sheeting in front of me trying not to look at my reflection in the bullet resistant glass. I was a pitiful thing.

"Look, we don't have time for this," he said. "There are other things we need to talk about." He walked away out of my sight. I had to twist around to see him walk to his own truck.

I was still stretched out over the huvee's hood when he came back holding a thick manila folder. "What's this?" I asked.

"It's the assignment you were supposed to get hours before you up and left," he scolded.

All I could do was look at him and say, "I was promised vacation."

"Damn-it, Nate. You know that's conditional! Almost six years we spent on you!" He just shook his head and flipped over the cover of the folder to reveal a pile of criminal investigation files. "You don't get to just leave when you want. People depend on you, us. I- depend on you!

I gave him a look and said, "You need to unshackle me for this."

He knew it just as I did. "If you run for it, it means I can't trust you. I'll put you down."

"I'm not going to run," I said. I was certain I wouldn't get away and uncertain that I didn't want to know the rest of what was in that folder.

Pops dug around inside the humee's console until he came up with a key the key for the shackles. He unbound me and I rubbed at my wrists.

"You do this yourself?" he asked, gesturing at the heavy shackles and the vampire.

"The shackles, I think," I replied. "It got real dark there for a while. I think that frog I told you about did the vamp."

"Sheesh…" he said, voice trailing off. He took a heavy drag on his cigar and pointed at the folder with it. "Brace yourself Nate, this one is… ," he said through the cigar in his mouth. I frowned at him and opened the flipped on. Inside, there was a series of packets bound with paperclips. I scanned through them. There were shipping manifests, with cargo discrepancies highlighted, one packet was series of missing persons reports, another was of files of mostly Hispanic looking men presumably of questionable character, and then there was the last one, a case file. It had pictures.

The picture was of a little South American girl. She had long brown hair, dark eyes, she wore a little yellow dress stained with dirt, and blood. She was as pale as her dark complexion aloud in death. The photo had been taken late in the day and the over bright flash of the camera set everything in the photo into sharp relief. The two large caliber bullet holes in her back, and the dark blood were especially stark against the yellow. She was face front down in the mud her head turned to her right; eyes full of empty. Her dress was loose on her and is showed the half healed scarring of repeated bight marks where her shoulder met her neck. I noticed she was missing some baby teeth and her dirty cheeks had long streaks where tears had cleaned them.

I am normally quiet a stoic man, I rarely show emotion. I make an effort not to, it makes dealing with people easier. I had done just that controlled my body language and facial expressions during my conversation with Pops, as much as I could anyway. I don't show emotion, but this hit me hard and I wasn't paying attention. It's something about kids. I was a big brother once.

The little girl's hand was not in the shot. Her right arm was outstretched. I noticed because it was out of the ordinary for the a crime scene photo of this nature not to include the entire body. The picture was labeled on the back. I read, "Jane doe, age ≈ 8". I looked at the next picture and it showed me why the little girls hand was not in shot.

It was holding the hand of a little boy. Same brown hair, same brown eyes, same complexion. The resemblance was remarkable. He had fallen front first as well. He'd been shot dead by a single large caliber bullet wound to the base of his neck which also bore similar bight wounds. He wore no shirt only jean short that looked too big for him. The back of the picture read "John Doe, age≈13".

There was another picture beneath this one too. It showed the pair of them lying in the mud holding hands. From the way they had fallen together, I could see that the boy, probably her older brother, had fallen first dragging her down to her knees with him. She had likely made an effort to see what was wrong but the sudden impact of bullets had made her crumple the rest of the way. The bullets hadn't instantly killed though. She had cried staring into the vacant gaze of the boy.

It had taken me only a few moments to take in those pictures, and when I looked up I noticed that there were tears in my eyes. They were about to fall and quickly I wiped them away.

"I'm keeping this," I said holding up the folder. "When do we leave?"

"After breakfast."


End file.
